The China dilemma

This column is being produced on an Apple computer for adequate wages in a safe environment.

I wish I could say the same about the Apple computer itself.

The computer was produced in a Chinese factory that pays employees far less than American manufacturers and works them in ways few American workers — or consciences — would tolerate.

I’ve become more aware of this after reading two well-researched articles published last week in the New York Times about Apple outsourcing jobs to China. I encourage you to read them online. You’ll learn more in 20 minutes about why America’s manufacturing base is struggling than you will in 20 hours of listening to the gasbags on the radio and TV who quite literally do not know what they are talking about.

Here’s a very brief summary of what you would read. Many Apple products are produced in Foxconn City, a 230,000-employee factory complex in China where workers can toil up to 12 hours six days a week for wages as low as $17 per day. By comparison, the city of Little Rock is home to 193,524 people, according to the 2010 U.S. Census Bureau.

These Chinese factories exist for one reason: To do whatever it takes to produce goods as cheaply as possible. In one case, Apple made a change order on the iPhone just weeks before it was due to hit the stores. Half a world away, 8,000 Chinese workers were roused from their dormitory beds — yes, about a quarter of Foxconns employees live in dorms — handed a cup of tea and a biscuit, and told to get to work. Within four days, the plant was producing 10,000 iPhones daily with the new specs.

American manufacturers cannot hope to compete with that, which is why these days you are finding less and less American-made products in retail stores.

To be fair, Apple is trying to ensure its workers are treated better, though it could solve the problem entirely if it made it a higher priority. Also, the workers at Foxconn City chose to be there and can quit at any time.

Let’s look at this in three ways: the long view, the patriotic perspective, and the personal choices we all make.

Start with the long view: Chinese workers are overworked and underpaid, but at least they are worked and paid. Over time, they will demand better situations, and management grudgingly will comply. The children of these factory workers will go to better schools than their parents did.

Eventually, China no longer will be the world’s most economical work force, so the jobs will move to other impoverished countries, where the cycle will repeat. In fact, multinational corporations have done more to end extreme global poverty than aid agencies and charities ever could.

Now let’s take the patriotic perspective: We are selling ourselves out. Policy by policy and shopping trip by shopping trip, Americans are hollowing the country’s industrial base, putting neighbors out of work, and transferring the country’s wealth to an unelected Chinese elite that doesn’t respect basic freedoms of speech or religion.

So that leads us to our personal choices. I’ve wrestled with this a little and finally come up with this: Embrace the global economy because it has done a lot of good and isn’t going away, but buy American when you can find a manufacturer and when the price is what you can pay.

I would limit my business with a Main Street merchant if I knew he or she took advantage of employees who weren’t in a position to work elsewhere. I should do the same with these big multinational corporations.

At this stage of my career, switching from Apple to another maker would be very problematic and would do a limited amount of good.

But I can put off future purchases in hopes that Apple will continue to improve its business practices. Instead of being enticed by the newest miracle gizmo, I’ll use the computer and iPhone I have until they break down, and then I’ll replace them, guilt-free, just like I do everything else conceived by American minds but now built only by Chinese hands.

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Steve Brawner is an independent journalist in Arkansas. His e-mail address is brawnersteve@mac.com.